Get the latest from Windows Server experts, product managers, and evangelists at one online destination. The Windows Server Experts blog has the tips, tutorials, and advice IT pros need to get the most out of Windows Server 2008 R2.

Focusing on Windows Server 2003, Windows Server 2008 and R2, Storage Server, HPC, Foundation, EBS, SBS, and Virtualization.

The Microsoft Windows Virtualization Product Group Team Blog.

Accelerating virtualization.

Get the latest information on the Dynamic Data Center Toolkits for Hosters and Enterprises from Alliance Partners, Customers and Internal Microsoft folks.

Windows Server 2008 R2 provides enhanced management control over resources across the enterprise. It is designed to provide better energy efficiency and performance by reducing power consumption and lowering overhead costs. It also helps provide improved branch office capabilities, exciting new remote access experiences, streamlined server management, and expands the Microsoft virtualization strategy for both client and server computers.

Windows Server 2008 R2 addresses cost savings across a number of areas, including streamlined management, less reliance on expensive third-party software, more scalable application serving and lowered WAN bandwidth costs. Customers have seen server consolidation rates up to 3-to-1 as well as up to an 80% decrease in IT man-hours spent on rote administrative tasks like file system management.

Watch this TechNet Edge video for a look at Hyper-V server and a quick lesson on getting started with virtualization technology on Windows Server.

Windows Server 2008 R2 adds powerful enhancements to Hyper-V including increased availability, improved management, and simplified deployments. The new version of Hyper-V also includes an exciting feature called Live Migration – the ability to move virtual servers across physical hosts in the datacenter with no perceived downtime for users, so IT can restructure the datacenter as business needs demand without stopping important work streams.

It's rarely wise to state that a new operating system is more secure than its predecessor because security flaws can take months to come to light after the software is released, but Paul Rubens says in the case of Windows Server 2008 we can say it with some confidence.

There are a number of new Active Directory Domain Services features in Windows Server 2008. These new features improve auditing, security, and the management of Active Directory Domain Services and show Microsoft's commitment to evolving Active Directory Domain Services. The following is an overview of the new Active Directory Domain Services features that are in Windows Server 2008.

This paper shows technical decision makers and IT managers how organizations can reduce costs and improve their IT efficiency by optimizing their core infrastructure and adopting server-related best practices. This paper identifies which best practices are most effective in driving IT efficiency to reduce operating costs and free up human and financial IT resources to add more value to the business.

Traditional storage arrays struggle to meet all of the performance and agility needs of a virtualized server environment. 3PAR Utility Storage solves the storage challenges of this environment using massive parallelization for exceptional performance, 3PAR Thin Provisioning to allow physical storage to be allocated when used rather than when planned, and 3PAR Dynamic Optimization to tailor storage performance without disruption.

Lionbridge Technologies, a localization services provider, needed to centralize its IT infrastructure. The company deployed virtual servers in its corporate data center by using Hyper-V™ in Windows Server® 2008 and then upgrading to Windows Server 2008 R2. As a result, Lionbridge has cut electricity costs by 75 percent in its virtualized environment, decreased hardware expenses, and tripled server infrastructure while using existing floor space.

This overview introduces Microsoft's virtualization technologies, focusing on three areas: hardware virtualization, presentation virtualization, and application virtualization. Since every technology, virtual or otherwise, must be effectively managed, this discussion also looks at Microsoft’s management products for a virtual world. The goal is to make clear what these offerings do, describe a bit about how they do it, and show how they work together.

Windows Server 2008 has added several very useful enhancements to Terminal Services (TS). TS Remote Apps lets you present TS based applications to users in a way that is virtually identical to a standard desktop app.

The forum for general R2 questions as well as questions for Directory Services, File Services, Group Policy, Deployment, Migration, Printing, and Server Core.

The forum for questions on Windows Server 2008 R2 Hyper-V and Remote Desktop Services (formerly Terminal Services).